


a few miles from tomorrow

by dizzy



Category: Glee
Genre: Canon Compliant, M/M, Post-Series, married klaine
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-29
Updated: 2015-07-29
Packaged: 2018-04-11 22:11:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,835
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4454261
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dizzy/pseuds/dizzy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Kurt meets Rachel for brunch every Sunday. Today, she's got a few questions for him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	a few miles from tomorrow

Sometimes Kurt has dreams in which nothing has changed in the past four months. His muddled dream self is plagued with regrets and forced to relive the most excruciating moments of his life, watching Blaine walk away with someone else, knowing it happened because of him. 

His therapist tells him that he needs to work on taking responsibility for his own actions and in those nightmare moments he embodies that while still resenting it. 

He's woken up in tears more than once, breath catching and pulse a sick drum, in the grips of a phantom panic attack. In the three am hour it feels hopeless even with his redemption sleeping peacefully beside him. 

* 

He meets Rachel for brunch every Sunday morning. Sometimes Blaine joins them, but sometimes he uses the morning for homework to free up his afternoon to spend with Kurt. Kurt finds no reason for complaint in either option. 

Today, over pastry and coffee, they talk relationships. 

Rachel has been dancing around this topic for weeks now. Kurt knows she's trying so hard not to repeat patterns and past mistakes, but Rachel will always be Rachel, circling back to what she knows. "How do you know this time it will work, with Blaine? When you've already been together and it didn't... how can you just... forgive?" 

It's not a question anyone has had the guts to ask him straight out like that, outside of those safe walls of a paid professional. But he has had so much time to work it out, with that guidance, that he's prepared to answer. "There's no 'just' about it. And no two situations are the same. Blaine and I are not the people we were two years ago. We were teenagers, it would be ridiculous if we were." 

"But, still." She looks doubtful. "He hurt you so badly." 

"And then I hurt him," Kurt says. "Because I didn't know how to do that - how to forgive. And if I'd realized that back when he proposed, I could have saved us both a lot of heartbreak, but I didn't. I didn't realize that I was looking at Blaine like he had something to make up to me, like I could treat him however I wanted and he just had to accept it because he owed me, because he - because he cheated. He made a dumb mistake and I punished him by never letting him get too close after that. I was still afraid and I didn't understand it and neither did he." 

"So you're saying it was good for you - to grow?" She asks. 

"I don't know if either of us would use the word 'good' to describe anything about us the past couple of years," Kurt admits. "But I think it was unrealistic to ever have so much faith that a high school relationship could last and stay exactly the same. Blaine and I are both still... figuring it out. Growing, like you said. We're just trying very, very hard this time to make sure that we do it together." 

"Isn't that something you should have done before getting married?" There's the tiniest bit of very Rachel-like judgement in her voice, but Kurt knows how to look past it. 

"I probably would have been fine waiting," Kurt admits. "But I think Blaine needed it. And I needed to prove to Blaine that I was serious about being back together. There is not a single cell of my body that thinks he wouldn't have ended up my husband eventually anyway." 

There's so much there he won't share with Rachel there. The tears, the unsteady feeling that emerges between them sometimes, Blaine's depression and Kurt's own anxiety, 

But one thing he's not at all afraid to expose to the world is how much he loves his husband. 

"Besides," Kurt continues. "Now we get the tax breaks and we can put all that money we're saving toward a real wedding. But, shh. Blaine doesn't know that yet." 

Rachel's face lights up. "Really?" 

"I think he deserves a proposal like the one he gave me, don't you?" Kurt grins. Getting engaged might have been a horribly premature mistake, but god if that proposal won't go down as one of the most romantic moments of his life. "But - more about that later. Back to you and Jesse St. James-" 

"I never said-" Rachel gasps, trying to deny it. 

"You didn't have to. Now, listen. You were a stupid kid and so was Jesse. My best advice is to just try and create the blankest slate you can. Would you want someone looking at you and only seeing who you were at sixteen?" 

Rachel cringe. "No." 

"Then don't do that to him." Kurt sits back, licking a sugary streussel crumb from his fingertip. 

"What if..." Rachel starts, then sighs. "Are you ever afraid that you're just clinging to something familiar because you're afraid of how big the world is?" 

That's a new thought for Kurt. "I don't know," he says, allowing himself a brief moment to muse on it. "But I did face the world without Blaine, and I didn't like it. I tried, honestly - but my heart was with him." 

She smiles just a little. "That's so sweet." 

"It was the most painful thing I think I'll ever experience in my life," Kurt says. "But knowing that he and I both tried to actually live our lives apart was good perspective. I know for absolutely certain now that he is the person who makes me happiest, and that we both have to treat each other well and respectfully and not take that for granted." 

"So you don't ever get angry over what he did?" Rachel asks. "Cheating, or dating... well..." 

She knows better than most how Kurt still flinches at the name. No matter how someone may change as a person, it's still impossible to deny that David Karofsky was responsible two of the worst moments of Kurt's life - being assaulted, and then finding out that Blaine was not actually just sitting around waiting for Kurt to want him back. 

"I get angry." Kurt shrugs slightly in acknowledgement. "But it passes. Usually when I look at Blaine and realize that no matter how bad I feel, Blaine feels it much more deeply when he's hurt someone. It's just... who he is as a person, how he's wired." 

Understanding that was a turning point for Kurt, too. They've both had to learn to understand and be aware of those critical difference in how they approach life and emotional situations. 

"So you think I should really give Jesse a chance?" Rachel asks, that wistful tone to her voice. 

Kurt knows the answer she wants to hear. He smiles as he says, "I think you should." 

* 

Blaine's on the phone when Kurt walks in. His face lights up at the fresh coffee and pastry shop bag in Kurt's hand, reaching out with a childish grasping 'gimme' gesture. 

Kurt holds it back and shakes his head, pursing his lips expectantly. It just makes Blaine smile harder, so wide that the kiss he gives Kurt is more tooth than anything else. 

"Okay, Mom, Kurt just walked in so I gotta go... yeah, love you too." He hangs up and tosses his phone aside, grabbing the coffee and inhaling deeply. "You are the absolute best." 

"I try." Kurt preens a little. But the tone of the conversation with Rachel and the remnants of the dream the night before have him looking extra hard at Blaine, the tousled hair (still gelled, but the looser 'weekend look' Blaine adopts when he's not really going anywhere) and the old McKinley shirt and Kurt's pajama bottoms... "I love you so much." 

Blaine's still the one that says it first most of the time, so he always looks a little bit surprised when Kurt just blurts that out. But Kurt's trying, he's trying to remember that Blaine just naturally needs a little more reassurance than Kurt himself does. 

Just like Blaine is working on remembering that Kurt has a more independent nature and sometimes needs a little space. Both of them, they're just - trying. They're trying so fucking hard because the clock doesn't reset each time they fail, they've only got so many attempts. Kurt is determined not to need anymore. 

"What brought that on?" Blaine asks, settling cross-legged on the couch and biting into his breakfast. 

"Just talking with Rachel earlier." Kurt toes off his shoes and leaves his jacket hanging by the door, neatly arranged just so. He joins Blaine on the couch, pulling one leg under him so he can turn to face Blaine. "So, I'm pretty sure she's going to give it another shot with Jesse..." 

Blaine's eyes widen, homework forgotten as he lets Kurt catch him up on the gossip. 

* 

"How did I get so lucky?" Blaine asks that night, watching Kurt walk naked out of the bathroom. Blaine's in bed already, but sitting up on his laptop.

Kurt just laughs. "Well, I think it started after dinner when you did that thing where you trail your fingers down my-" 

"Kurt!" Blaine laughs. "I meant in general, not specifically tonight." 

"I knew that." Kurt kneels on the bed beside Blaine, leaning over to kiss him. It's a sweet kiss, all more base needs met for the night. "And you're sweet. Even if I'm pretty sure you meant my naked form and not my sparkling personality." 

"I meant both," Blaine graciously says. 

"Fine, fine." Kurt joins Blaine under the covers, snuggling up to him. They rarely sleep like that, but pre-sleep cuddles are definitely one of the perks to a live-in partner - to a husband. "I'll allow it." 

Blaine takes the hint and puts his laptop away. The bedside lamp goes off, the Monday morning alarm is double checked, and then he slips down to lay by Kurt, sinking into Kurt's ever so slightly possessive embrace. "Good day?" Blaine asks. He does that sometimes, like he just needs to check, or wants to hear it from Kurt. 

"The best day." Kurt presses a kiss to Blaine's shoulder, smiling. Blaine brushes fingers through Kurt's hair, still damp from his shower. Kurt grows sleepy under the touch, yawning and then burrowing down. "'night."

"Goodnight." Blaine stretches too, shifting a little but not moving away, not yet. 

Kurt's glad. Blaine's body is warm and everything about him - the scent of him after the morning's shower and deodorant has worn off, the rise and fall of his chest, the little twitches as he falls asleep - every visceral reminder of his presence, is soothing to Kurt. 

He almost speaks, almost asks Blaine if he'll protect him from his nightmares. It would be cute, just a little joke, but he doesn't want to wake Blaine if he's too close to sleep. And, besides - he doesn't really need to ask. Nightmares and anxiety dreams aren't fun, but at the end of the night they'll be gone and he'll still wake up to his husband beside him.

**Author's Note:**

> Find it on tumblr [here](http://alittledizzy.tumblr.com/post/125356314145/a-few-miles-from-tomorrow-kurtblaine-pg-13-18k).


End file.
